The second evening of the derby drew another big crowd.

MWAH:

Every once in a while a car loses a sliiiiiightly important part.

The driver wasn’t amused by that development, but as you can see in the above photo, the crowd enjoyed it.

Another car got stuck on the wall.

When the heat was done, the car that lost more than just a tire needed some help to exit the arena.

Here’s a closer look at the damage.

If you had told 10 year old me I would see this device doing this task at a demolition derby someday, I probably would have said “A WHATphone?”

I also probably would have said “Where do you put the VHS tape?” and also maybe “Who are you and why are you talking so confidently about the year 2013?”

Partway through the derby, the officials stopped the action and the firefighters rushed to a car that clearly wasn’t on fire.

Before long, paramedics joined the firefighters.

From my angle I couldn’t see what they were doing, but they worked for a bit — maybe 10-15 minutes — until the driver emerged with her arm heavily reinforced.

I got a chance to talk to the driver a week later. It was an unpleasant injury that’ll take time to heal, but she’ll be okay. Injuries like that aren’t common in the derby — I couldn’t remember seeing a stoppage like that, and another spectator could remember seeing only one other similar stoppage — but things can happen when you crash a bunch of cars into each other.

When everyone was clear, the derby resumed. And there were more people recording the action.

There was a young fan enjoying the derby, too.

A bit later there was a very minor fire.

Fires like that aren’t uncommon in the derbies, and they’re typically short-lived and inconsequential. This one was no exception. But it made for a fun photo!

There was a pickup truck heat during the Wednesday derby. Since trucks are built to stay in one piece and run forever, the truck derbies tend to be a lot of fun.

Remember what I said in the Tuesday derby post about the moment when a radiator explodes with a loud POP and a cloud of steam and the crowd laughs and cheers? This is what that looks like:

Now that I think about it, perhaps SHUMP would a better description of that sound. Would you agree, derby aficionados?

MWAH:

When the trucks were done rumpling metal, the cars came back out for the Wednesday final.

That’s it for the regular demolition derby photos, but there are plenty of fair photos to come!

The Chelsea Fair has always included plenty of livestock, but a relatively new offering at the fair is a barn that features both recently born animals and live births (if the timing is right). When I visited the barn, I found a crowd around the piglets.

Elsewhere, there were rabbits. Lots and lots of rabbits. I found one rabbit that was having an especially relaxing afternoon.

When I was browsing the craft barn, I found a craft with a familiar face on it:

Those are newspaper flowers in a newspaper bag, and as you can see, the newspaper she used for the front of the bag is the front page from the week I was named Chelsea citizen of the year. Kira, the cheerful young Chelsea resident who made that craft, told me she used that page on purpose and asked them to be sure it was visible. Thank you, Kira!